Narrator: I grew up on pastureland. Cows, chickens, farms, bare feet in soil. I was considered a “city girl” because I lived on the busiest road in town. There weren’t many roads in town, though. That wasn’t all that made me different. I’d moved from Florida when I was 8, and I never quite stopped feeling like the new girl. I wanted to go to college, I wanted to do theatre, I wanted to travel – and I knew I wanted to do these things by the time I was 12. Other 12-year-old girls in Hartwell, Georgia found these concepts foreign. They wanted to marry Luke Breedlove, (the cutest boy in school) live in the backyard of their parents, down the street from their grandparents, on the land of the great grandparents. This was as far as they looked ahead. I was without the roots they seemed to be grounded by. In other ways, I was certainly the same as other girls my age. I tried to wish away my acne, will my hair to be blonder, pray for my chicken legs to fill out...And maybe if Luke had just looked my way..
Life in the country was simple. I longed for summer, where I spent every day at the pool and every night at the community theatre, rehearsing for whatever play would be hitting the stage next. I jumped in sprinkles and laughed with friends and drank sugary, cheap juice. I still go back every so often to visit my parents. When I’m there, and the temperature is just right, I long for those summers again, and the simplicity of being 12 that no longer remains.
Life in the country was simple. I longed for summer, where I spent every day at the pool and every night at the community theatre, rehearsing for whatever play would be hitting the stage next. I jumped in sprinkles and laughed with friends and drank sugary, cheap juice. I still go back every so often to visit my parents. When I’m there, and the temperature is just right, I long for those summers again, and the simplicity of being 12 that no longer remains.